The team is now in it’s 3rd year of working on rovers, and are working towards competing in the University Rover Challenge (URC) which takes place in Utah at the end of May 2019.

The team built the rover last year, and are now working further on coding and electronics to improve the functions of the rover, and expand it’s capabilities with autonomous operations.

The URC requires the rover to perform in-situ science tasks, autonomous navigation, and manipulation and collection of objects using it’s robotic arm. This will include picking up and delivering tools, turning levers, pressing switches and typing commands on a keyboard.

The URC is the premier space robotics challenge in the world, and has over 100 entries from universities globally. Last year the team scored 67, with the cut-off for entry being 70, so this year they are hoping to improve on that score and make it to the competition, and be only the 2nd UK team to do so in the process.